After Seven Empty Chairs, I Took My Daughter and Left Chapter 23

After Seven Empty Chairs, I Took My Daughter and Left Chapter 23

Elias didn’t tell the whole truth.

He didn’t say that when he learned Ava had married, he had never intended to be a mere bystander. The Mercer family’s lawyers and investigators had long since been ordered to compile a dossier on Whitaker Group’s commercial weaknesses. He had been waiting for the right time to use the giant hand of capital to crush that mistaken marriage completely.

Sloane’s appearance had simply moved everything ahead of schedule. It was almost as if God Himself were helping him.

He knew taking advantage of someone in a vulnerable moment wasn’t honorable, but in the world he inhabited—a world that cared only for results—the dignity of the process meant nothing.

Now, Ava’s long silence filled him with a violent unease. Her beautiful eyes were full of shock and confusion, but not the wild joy he wanted. If she was going to refuse him… a dark thought flashed through his mind. Then he would bring her and Lily back to the Mercer estate on Nantucket, so she would never see anyone but him again.

He had that ability. In the blood of old-money families flowed an innate, shadowed desire for control.

Just as that desire was about to devour his reason, Ava finally spoke, her voice carrying a barely perceptible choke.

“I thought… I didn’t know you’d felt that way for so long…” Her words were disordered, but filled with an enormous shock and a trace of belated emotion. It turned out that during all those years she had chased Noah’s back until she had exhausted herself, another gaze had been resting quietly behind her the entire time.

Hearing the tremor in her voice, Elias’s heart clenched hard. All dark, mad thoughts instantly vanished, leaving only an overwhelming tenderness and pain for her. He stepped forward and pulled her tightly into his arms.

Fine. As long as she was happy, that was enough. He could take his time.

“I admit I have some feelings for you,” Ava said, her voice muffled against his chest. “But I just came out of a failed marriage. I’ve made an appointment with a therapist. I’m afraid… I’m afraid to enter another relationship right away. Do you understand what I mean?”

Hearing the words “some feelings,” Elias felt as if fireworks were exploding in his heart. As for the “some,” he automatically ignored it. As long as there was even a spark, he had a way to make it burn into a prairie fire.

He released her, but his hands remained on her shoulders, forcing her to look into his eyes.

“It’s all right, Ava.” His voice was gentle and firm, carrying a force that brooked no argument. “As long as you feel even a little something for me, just stand where you are and don’t run away. I’ll walk the rest of the way to you.”

When Elias’s hot palm wrapped around her cold fingers, Ava suddenly heard a loud crack on the left side of her chest, like the Charles River, frozen all winter, finally breaking under the warm spring sun.

Just then, the iPhone in her pocket suddenly vibrated. Several missed calls from an unknown number appeared on the screen.

She knew who it was.

Ava took out her phone and, without looking at it, pressed the mute button. She let the screen’s faint light flicker at her fingertips, then disappear completely into the deep red reflection of the glass of Bordeaux Elias had just poured for her.